


Horseman, Pass By!

by Lanna Michaels (lannamichaels)



Category: Highlander: The Series
Genre: Episode: s05e09 The Messenger, Podfic Available, Quotes William Butler Yeats
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-09-14
Updated: 2006-09-14
Packaged: 2017-10-03 03:32:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lannamichaels/pseuds/Lanna%20Michaels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Methos: The Man. The Myth. The Messenger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Horseman, Pass By!

**Author's Note:**

> Dialogue is from The Messenger. The title is from Under Ben Bulben by William Butler Yeats.
> 
>  
> 
> * * *
> 
> Podfic by [](http://tinypinkmouse.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**tinypinkmouse**](http://tinypinkmouse.dreamwidth.org/) is [available here](http://amplificathon.livejournal.com/1047581.html). :D

I met him in a garden. It seemed fitting. He had spent his life promoting peace and harmony between Immortals and now he was tilling the soil, preparing for a new generation. He always was about change. He believed we could change ourselves, he believed we could end the game. I could call him a fool, but I had too much respect for the unarmed among us. He might be reckless, but he did believe, and Darius, if nothing else, proved that faith is strength.

"Methos, I presume."

I didn't realize until I saw him that I had met him once before. It was a long time ago in a tavern that has long-since crumbled into dust. He was younger then, still mortal, and I was a passing traveler. He listened to my stories all night long and, when they were over, wanted to know only one thing: if the hero had become better through his troubles.

My doppelganger always was ahead of his times. I'd kept tabs on him through the centuries, making sure to stay far away from the man waving the Methos name around like a red flag to attract hunters. If he wanted my troubles, he was welcome to them. He preached peace to battle-hardened killers. I had no idea how he's managed to live this long.

Back when he was still sane, Kronos would pester me for the same stories I would tell in taverns. He said I had a way of lengthening the tale that reminded him of beggars in the streets, competing between themselves for the best story, with alms their sole reward. He wanted to know why I spoke like they did and why I had the pauper's skill in weaseling gold out of rich men.

Kronos never was as smart as he thought he was. Cunning, yes, but he always lacked the essential depth that would let him grow up. When last I saw him, he was still raving about conquering the world. Kronos, I told him, if Alexander could not do it, then you can not do it.

But he never listened, and off he went. And what did it get him? Four centuries in a well.

"So they tell me."

When I left Byron, I wandered across Switzerland, tracing and retracing my steps, wondering what I had done wrong. Byron was supposed to be the bright light of that century. Instead, he spent most of that magnificent life burning out. He sent me his new album last month. I listened to it and came away with only one impression: I've recreated Kronos.

Kronos always tried to surround himself with Horsemen wherever he went. I always tried to find brothers. Byron should have been my student and my equal, as Kronos was. Instead, I think I may have to kill him one of these centuries. He is on the edge of falling into insanity. I will not create another Kronos or another Caspian.

It was such a shame. Byron had such promise.

"Is it true that you were a friend of Socrates?"

But what a useful tool this Methos has turned out to be. I made the mistake of telling him my name that night and I suppose he took it as a title of our race. To be Methos is to be Immortal. I wondered when he learned the truth: that Methos was the nightmare of the millennium, the scourge of the sands, one of the Four.

I wondered if hearing that was what turned him into...this. Always working to correct the damage I've done. Oh, you stupid fool. You are the anti-Methos. I doubt you even know how inadequate you are to call yourself Methos. You may be the real Methos, but I was the first.

"I've had many friends."

He never knew Socrates. I'd bet good money he never met Cleopatra. But I, ah, yes, I knew Socrates. That's one part of the Methos legend that's mine. Everything else is him, and I've capitalized on that inbred goodwill towards Methos that all young Immortals seemed to have. I've used it for my own advantage more than once. Who would believe the cynical youngster was truly Methos when there was a wise old man with a flowing beard to say otherwise? Stereotypes could be wonderful protective coloring.

Only once was I able to convince Kronos of this. It was long before we became Four and I was in a spot of trouble. He was, too, but Kronos was always of a mind to fight our way out of delicate situations. He thought sneaking out was for cowards and he told me I'd have to take his head before he would let me put him in a disguise. I won in the end, of course, but it still makes me chuckle, the thought of that proud warrior wearing a dress.

This Methos was lucky to not have my nightmares, but he was all the poorer for not having my dreams.

"A lot of people might want to listen to a five thousand year old man."

Five thousand meant nothing. It was just a number. I've always had a feeling the Watchers made it up. I certainly couldn't remember my birth, but it's a nice round number, so I'll take it. He had no right to it, but no one checked birth certificates in the Impersonate Famous Immortals club. And rightly so. After the other Macleod killed the Kurgan, most of us ancients buried our tracks even deeper in case that Macleod got a taste for power and wanted more. Let the children have all the fun. You'll live longer.

Well, not this one. Someone should have told him that the ancients around the younger Macleod either get in his good graces or die. After Darius was...removed, I would have thought the word would have gotten out.

It's too bad he's going to die; he was useful. But he can have one final use. The Watchers have pictures of him now. He can be Methos forever in the Chronicle and news of his death will spread quickly through the Immortal community. One last kindness for him, to let him die the name he embraced and I spurned. With Methos finally gone, I will be able to breathe again. There's always the nagging worry that Kronos will find me, and as much as I tried not to think about it, even I have problems sleeping at night.

Kill ten thousand people and see how well you sleep. I have been Lady Macbeth to the king of dreams too many times. I know the blood on my hands.

"Can anyone live for five thousand years and truly say they did nothing? Risked nothing, merely stayed alive? It'd be pretty pointless."

Yes, my child. Even four thousand years later, you still want to know the moral of the story. Does the hero learn from his calamities? Does he still curse the gods? Odysseus's only mistake was to tell the Cyclops his name, but he did it time and time again, every night in my stories. Night after night, the hero made the fatal mistake and night after night, Poseidon ravaged his ships.

No, the moral of the story is this: Live. Grow stronger. With a name like Methos, you won't be forgotten, but everything else is like writing in the sand. The Four Horsemen still ride through legend, but who remembers them as fact? The Four of us and our victims. Even the Watchers have forgotten.

I'd call it humbling if I didn't find it incredibly useful.

"I didn't catch your name."

"No, that's right. You didn't."

He chuckled behind me and I take one last look at him. I lent him my name; I took his legend. Macleod would never have trusted the horseman, but he would embrace the man of peace. I used this Methos ruthlessly. The least I can do is give him one final look before knowingly sending him to his death.

I could stop it. I could tell him who pursued him and let him run. But I won't. In this century, he's more useful to me dead than alive.

I'm five thousand years old. This is nowhere near the worst that I have done.

_Cast a cold eye  
On life, on death.  
Horseman, pass by!_  
-W.B. Yeats, Under Ben Bulben

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Horseman, Pass By! [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/313772) by [tinypinkmouse_podfic (tinypinkmouse)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tinypinkmouse/pseuds/tinypinkmouse_podfic)




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